He was there again the next day. And the day after that. Not on Friday though; he told me on our Thursday meeting that his Friday schedule was so packed, it was insane. And of course he was never free after six at night. I had a feeling he led a life much more exciting than mine. He was always out with his friends.
But he didn't seem to mind that I was taking up a little bit of his time almost every day. It wasn't much - on Mondays when our schedules clashed horribly, we only had time for a hi-bye sort of passing greeting - but it was enough. I did wonder why he was willing to take the time out to talk to someone he considered a stalker, but never brought up the topic.
I didn't want to know if it turned out that he was conducting a social experiment of his own on me.
On our third meet-up, I realized we'd never formally introduced ourselves to each other. At that point, I figured it would've just been weird if we went through the whole handshaking routine now, so I let it go. He'd given me his name the day we'd met, but I was so used to referring to him as 'Brown Eyes' that I hadn't put much effort into remembering his real name.
Well... Hadn't it been Shakespeare who'd said, "What's in a name?"
Besides, I wasn't sure Brown Eyes remembered my name either. He just kept right on calling me 'Stalker Girl'.
On one hand, it was cool that he had a nickname for me. On the other... let's just say I wasn't too psyched about being reminded of my stalking episode every time I spoke to him. But of course, he would never let me forget it.
Two weeks after we'd first started talking to each other, I walked into the small café on the peripheral of both of our school buildings only to be greeted with a, "Stalked anyone else today?"
He grinned at me as I sat down at the table. It'd become something of a joke between us.
I raised my eyebrows in response to his greeting. "Of course! There was this guy with the purple hair, this guy with the red Mercedes, and another one with the most gorgeous shoes ever. You're lucky I even managed to fit you in."
He fake cried. "So I'm just another appointment to you?"
"Shh!" I widened my eyes, glancing from side to side as if to check for eavesdroppers. Then I lowered my voice and leaned in, "You're not supposed to know."
He laughed out loud. "You're crazy."
Half an hour and a cup of iced latte later, I was a little drunk on coffee. Looking into his eyes for thirty minutes straight had nothing to do with it. I swear.
"I don't know why people always say Asians have creaseless eyelids. I have creases in my eyelids. And we don't have slits for eyes, either!" I locked my eyes with his to prove the point. But gosh, the brown-ess of his eyes was so distracting.
Alright, maybe I'd just been searching for an excuse to stare into his eyes.
"You're half, aren't you? Maybe you don't count."
I was indignant. "I do count! I look more like my mom than my dad, anyway." I paused, then thought of something else to raise as evidence, "And Mom has creases in her eyelids too! Where she came from, about eighty percent of the people there - and they're fully Asian - have creased eyelids. And I've been there - they really do."
There was a little silence as he digested what I'd just said. I hoped he wasn't one of the people who subscribed to such stereotypes.
"Alright," he said after a while, "and remind me why we're talking about eyelid creases again?"
I frowned, trying to recall. "I think it started with me complimenting your eyes."
A corner of his mouth tilted upward. "As usual."
"Then I started complaining about my boring black eyes."
"They're not boring," he interjected. I knew he was just being nice.
"They're so dark!" I grumbled. "Black's boring."
"They're so dark I can see myself in them." He looked straight into my eyes and smirked. "That's interesting."
I started laughing. "You narcissist!"
We stared at each other, smiling.
"We digressed again," I realized.
He lounged back in his seat, raising his cup to his lips before he remembered that it was empty. It had been empty for a while. I smothered a giggle. "We have the craziest conversations," he said.
"That's why being with me is so much fun," I grinned at him.
He laughed, but didn't dispute my claim.
